If you are like us, you love to travel. Nothing gets you more excited than preparing for the next trip to a place you have never been to before. You love the thrill of choosing the next destination. You look forward to the next phone call with your travel agent. If you could get paid to travel, you would quit your full-time job in a heartbeat.
As travel planners, we have the privilege of combining our passion for travel with our means of making a living. Better yet, we get the reward of being able to help you plan the perfect trip every time you leave your home. Did you know that you could help us help you by letting us know what kind of traveler you are?
It has been our experience that people all have their own preferences when they travel. They all see things just a little bit differently. However, we believe it’s possible to divide travelers into different categories for the purposes of helping them plan. Those categories are listed below. Which one do you fall under?
The Meticulous Planner
Some travelers are meticulous about all of their plans. They want to know exactly when the plane will take off and land, down to the minute. They expect to arrive at the hotel at a specific time. The plan exactly when every meal will be eaten and every activity experienced.
Meticulous planning isn’t ideal for everyone. However, there’s no denying that some people thrive on it. We think that’s great. As concierge travel planners, it is our job to plan as much or as little as the client wants. We find planning everything down to the last minute a refreshing challenge.
The Relaxed Meanderer
The polar opposite of the meticulous planner is the relaxed meanderer. This is a traveler who just wants to know that she and her family will arrive at the chosen destination at some point on the scheduled day. After that, there are few plans to follow. For the relaxed menderer, too many plans are the enemy of a good time.
Meanderers like to do just that. They like to get up in the morning and do whatever appeals to them at the moment. At a Walt Disney World resort, that might mean going out front and hppping on the first bus that goes by. On a cruise, it might mean hanging out by the pool for a couple of hours before hitting the spa.
The Thrill Seeker
Some travelers are less about the plans and more about the thrills. They don’t care how much planning is done as long as they get to experience things that make their heart race and their adrenal glands go into overdrive. Some don’t even care what the particular activities are. As long as they get a rush, that’s all that matters.
Thrill seekers are a little bit more difficult to plan for due to the fact that it’s hard to know what truly constitutes a thrill. What you find thrilling might be boring to someone else. However, there are enough opportunities out there to work with. We can almost always find something.
The Destination Diva
Next up is the destination diva. This is a traveler whose entire focus is on the destination itself. For example, imagine a couple obsessed with Sandals resorts. They don’t care where in the world they travel as long as their final destination is a Sandals. These kinds of travelers know what they want and aren’t willing to compromise.
It can be hard to convince destination divas to try something new. That’s okay. Travel is all about enjoying yourself. If you are hooked on a particular destination and have no interest in going elsewhere, no worries. A good travel planner can make it happen.
The Postcard Perfectionist
The hardest travelers to plan for are the postcard perfectionists. They want everything to be absolutely perfect in every respect. We get that; we really do. You’re spending thousands of dollars every time you travel and you have certain expectations of what each trip will be like. If things don’t go perfectly as planned, you feel like you’ve lost out on something.
We do our best to make every client happy. However, experience has taught us that there’s no such thing as a perfect trip. Even if very small, something always goes wrong. The best we can do is go with the flow and fix what we can.
The Super Sponge
Last but not least is the super sponge. This is a traveler whose only goal is to soak up as much as possible in the allotted time. Always being on the go is a priority. For the super sponge, sleep is an inconvenience. There aren’t enough hours in the day to do everything on this traveler’s list.
Interestingly enough, super sponges come in all shapes, ages, and sizes. Believe it or not, there are senior travelers who seem to have a lot more energy than people 50 years younger. We’ve learned to never judge a book by its cover in this regard.
So, which kind of traveler are you? Maybe you identify with one particular category, or find that you overlap in more than one. It’s all good to us. Just help us help you by letting us know your travel preferences upfront. We can do a better job of helping you plan if we know what you’re thinking.
Matt and Ellen Gerwitz – Travel Agents from Dreamers Do Travels
